How to Write a Farewell Email to Your Co-workers

A couple years ago, I left Identrust to go work for Pay By Touch. I’d worked at Identrust and a predecessor company, eFinance, for 5 years. So I wanted my farewell email to be more than just good-bye. I wanted to impart deep wisdom to my colleagues as well

This is my farewellemail. These are funny things, these farewell emails. You only write them once every few years, and only as you’re heading out the door of a company. It’s an attempt to sum up several years’ experience with your colleagues in a pithy missive.

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Really, employees everywhere are winging it when they put these things together. Try Googling “farewellemail” and you won’t get much help (although this guy has a really funny send-up of the genre: http://chriskula.com/popular).

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I’ve saved a few farewell emails from my eFinance and Identrus colleagues over the years. After conducting an exhaustive, thorough analysis of these emails, I’ve prepared some pointers for the farewellemail (although hopefully this will not be something any of you need anytime soon).

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FAREWELLEMAIL TIPS

1. SUBJECT LINE

The subject line is the first thing all of us see. And it usually fits the personality of the sender. Remember that if someone saves your email, they’ll “know” you by the subject line in the long list of saved emails. A former colleague at eFinance used “Over and out!” for her subject line. With her aggressive, sharp personality, that subject line is a continuing reminder of her. And Shawn’s recent farewellemail had the subject line, “Good tidings”. Now that really does sound like Shawn, doesn’t it? Very positive.

2. “AS MANY OF YOU KNOW”

While not universal, it is common to open the email with a variation of, “as many of you know”. This recognizes that you have told several people internally already, and it would be impolitic to send out an email without acknowledging that fact. It’s debatable how necessary this is, but Miss Manners would approve of the courtesy extended to your “gentle readers”.

3. WHY YOU ARE LEAVING

Whenever a colleague leaves an organization, there are the inevitable questions as to why he or she is doing so. For those with whom you regularly work, you’ve probably already explained it. But there’s a wider audience for your farewellemail. People that may not have the full story and for whom your email serves as their only confirmed information. Don’t leave them hanging! Provide some information that gives a bit of closure. Again, Shawn’s recent farewellemail was very good in explaining his desire to move to Seattle. Another former eFinance colleague explained her decision to move to China with her husband. The rumor mill will always be out there, but this is your chance to say why you’re leaving.

4. RECOUNT YOUR WORK AT THE COMPANY

This is a universal, must-do in your email. I mean, you’ve done a lot of work with your colleagues, some of it exhilarating, some of it petrifyingly dull. This is the moment to remember the good times! Keep in mind that your email may be read at a later date; what do you want people to remember? Note, however, that it is not common practice to spell out specific accomplishments. Rather, a hearty “cheers” to your work together will suffice. Some examples:

“what a hair-raising, adrenaline-pumping, team-building experience”

“experience has been rewarding in many ways”

“accomplished a lot together”

“happy to have met and worked with you”

“appreciated the time we spent together”

“you have all been ‘Super Great’!”

5. CONTACT INFORMATION

Post-employment contact information is a nearly universal element of the farewellemail. The most common information provided to your colleagues is an outside email address, with some providing their mobile phone information as well. This is good info for those who remain after your departure – they may have to reach you about something! Of course, depending on your frame of mind as you leave, you may wish to enter the Ex-Employee Witness Protection Program instead, providing no contact information at all.

6. SIGN-OFF

You’ve gotten through the hardest parts of the letter, now it’s time for the sign-off. This really is a place for individual preferences. A crisp, business-like “Regards” may work for those who prefer not to get too mushy with their co-workers. Something like “Hugs” would be…well…cutesy, but could work for some folks. The most common approach is to maintain a professional decorum laced with a touch of warmth (e.g. “Warmest Regards”).

7. LENGTH OF EMAIL

Brevity is a common characteristic (editor’s note: hmmm….seem to have missed that one…).

So there you go, the Seven Characteristics of Highly Effective Farewell Emails. Now let’s put them into practice:

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Dear Friends & Colleagues –

As many of you know, today is my last day with Identrus. On Monday, I start my new job as a Product Manager for Pay By Touch, a company which offers biometric identification of consumers at the checkout of retailers. For me, the opportunity to move more into a product role has been something of interest for a while, so I’m looking forward to tackling that challenge. Pay By Touch is located here in San Francisco.

I joined eFinance way back in October 2000, and have many fond memories of the accomplishments there and more recently with Identrus. I want to thank all of you for the opportunity to work together and for teaching me something about this PKI business. Things are rolling here at Identrus and I wish you the best for a very bright future!

This is extremely useful stuff !! It is not one more of the several sites that offer sample notes, but capitalizes more on the real you and gives one the direction that needs to be tread. It still leaves a lot of scope for personalization, which is very essential in a farewell mail. Thank you very much for putting this up in a structured manner.

Yesterday was my last day at a company where I had an internship. They didn’t extend a full time offer. Obviously I was disappointed but thought my farewell email was an opportunity to leave with a touch of class. I started to write a fairly stock and almost “fill in the blank” like email. I stopped because I wanted my email to be more memorable, more personal and more human. This is what I wrote:

Subject: Good night, farewell and thank you.

Hello Friends,

Most of the time these farewell messages are fairly generic and short; “It’s been a pleasure to work with all of you. Please stay in touch”. While that sentiment rings true with me, I wanted to take this opportunity to write something more reflective and personal.

I started my internship in May with aspirations of landing a full time role on the floor. As most of you know by now things haven’t exactly worked out the way I had hoped or expected. And given the current state of markets it might be some time before I realize that goal. But the world likes to see winners, not victims. If there’s one thing I’ve learned from all of you during my time here at CIBC it is that no problem is unsolveable with the right mix of determination, will and tenacity. And I have no doubt that with the skills I’ve developed with the team at CIBC the question is not “if I will bounce back” but simply “when and where”.

It is easy for me to view my time as a failure given I haven’t acheived what I set out to accomplish. But I don’t. Through my mistakes, my failings, and more importantly by working with all of you, I have learned what hard work actually means, what it takes to be successful in this business and what I need to do to realize my full potential. These lessons alone have made every minute spent on the floor invaluable.

On a final note I would like to say thank you to all of you. Thank you for teaching me, thank you for the gift of your time and thank you for making this a great place to work. This has been one of the most high performing groups I’ve had the privelege of working with.

If you would like to stay in touch feel free to email me at [xyz@email.com] (cc’d) or call me at [1.234.567.8910].

I’ll conclude with one last message, and hopefully a gift. It’s a quote from my favourite poem and I turn to it when I need to regain my confidence or remind myself that it is only I who define who I am and who I become. I hope you draw as much inispiration from it as I do.

You could have also run a spell checker over it before sending it. It’s ‘privilege’, not ‘privelege’. It’s a real pity that the helpful paper clip in Word no longer pops up. It would have said “Looks like you are trying to write a farewell email but have instead composed a soppy, negative, eulogy for a failed internship”. I can’t imagine why you didn’t get offered an extension.

terrible email. This is way overboard. It seems like you are more resentful about not getting the job and quickly try to gracefully exit. It’s evident that you are butthurt about it and it’s almost a direct shot at the people that didn’t extend you the offer. If you were hoping that the email would ignite them to jump out of the bushes and reconsider their position, you sealed any new hope of that every happening much less be a positive reference.